Three deaths in six months highlight WA mining safety concerns

Three deaths in six months in WA's iron ore mines, and two of those at the same mine run by Andrew Forrest's Fortescue Metals Group, have raised safety questions for the company, the industry, and the state's mining watchdog.

Transcript

TRACY BOWDEN, PRESENTER: Western Australia's mining industry is reeling after a series of deaths in the State's mines. Three men have died in the last six months, two of them at the same mine run by Andrew Forrest's Fortescue Metals Group.

The deaths at the Christmas Creek mine have prompted claims that the company's putting profits ahead of safety and that WA's mining watchdog has been slow to act. While both the company and the regulator are defending their track records, the mother of one of the men who died has spoken out from her home in New Zealand.

This report was compiled by Dale Owens and Claire Moodie.

CLAIRE MOODIE, REPORTER: It's been an agonising six months for Diane Andrew.

DIANE ANDREW: I know just what I'm missing out on.

This memorial in her backyard in Auckland is dedicated to her son, Kurt, who died last year at a remote mine site thousands of kilometres away.

DIANE ANDREW: Kurt was all or nothing so he went over there so he could earn the big money.

(Diane going through photo albums)

I love this one. That's my screen saver at work. Yeah. No, he loved to party.

CLAIRE MOODIE: An electrician by trade, Kurt Williams was 24 when he left New Zealand to make his fortune on the mines in Western Australia.

DIANE ANDREW: No I didn't worry about him. He was very sensible, safety-conscious person, yeah.

CLAIRE MOODIE: But after just over a year in WA's burgeoning iron ore industry, Kurt Williams was killed at Christmas Creek mine in the Pilbara, while carrying out maintenance work on machinery.

DIANE ANDREW: Because it's under investigation they are limited as to what they can tell me. So, yeah, it's a bit upsetting. I don't really know what happened and if it could have been avoided.

(Les McLachlan on the phone)

LES MCLACHLAN, ELECTRICAL TRADES UNION, WA: Yeah Teddy it's Les here.

CLAIRE MOODIE: Union boss Les McLachlan believes it could have been avoided. He says he raised concerns with Kurt Williams' employer, the contractor Crushing Services International about safety problems well before his death.

LES MCLACHLAN: We were hearing that safety concerns were regularly getting raised and nothing was happening about it and if someone persisted on that, they were seen as being a stirrer.

CLAIRE MOODIE: Crushing Services International wouldn't be interviewed but in a statement its parent company denied the claim, saying staff are encouraged to voice any concerns without any fear of reprisal. But Les McLachlan also claims that the young electrician was working alone on the night he died and that shouldn't have been allowed.

LES MCLACHLAN: I would class that as one of your perfect storms of a potential accident. You get a relatively inexperienced worker working alone on night shift doing unnecessary work in operating plan, you know, some four or five storeys up.

(Excerpt from FMG corporate video)

VOICEOVER: "It's tough work out here so we do everything we can to look after our workforce while they're on their swing. They're our Fortescue family."

CLAIRE MOODIE: Since the tragedy, the family's been extended. FMG (Fortescue Metals Group) has taken over CSI's two ore processing plants and its workforce. Neither FMG nor Andrew Forrest himself would be interviewed by 7:30, but in a message to staff yesterday, the company stressed its commitment to safety.

NEV POWER, FORTESCUE METALS GROUP: I would like to make it absolutely clear that no-one on a Fortescue site is ever expected to do anything that compromises safety.

(Memorial for Kurt Williams at the mine site)

SPEAKER: Kurt Williams was a really great man, much loved by his colleagues.

CLAIRE MOODIE: The death of Kurt Williams was the first in a number of accidents at FMG's Pilbara operations.

In October, a truck driver had his leg amputated after an accident at Christmas Creek and last month 33-year-old contractor Alan Zuvela was killed at Christmas Creek's heavy machinery workshop.

DIANE ANDREW: It really upset me. You know, has his death been in vain? You know, at least if he'd died and no more deaths were going to happen. But the fact that they're still happening and there are injuries - one boy lost his leg - there's something wrong with the safety.

CLAIRE MOODIE: The latest death at Christmas Creek prompted WA's mine regulator to order the company to tighten safety procedures, but according to Mervyn Sher, a risk management consultant, the department of mines should have acted sooner.

MERVYN SHER, RISK MANAGEMENT CONSULTANT: As a regulator, shut the place down, issue a Section 45. Do something. That may well have prevented this last fatality.

CLAIRE MOODIE: The Department of Mines wouldn't be interviewed while the deaths are still being investigated, but industry leaders are concerned.

MELANIE STUTSEL, MINERAL COUNCIL OF AUSTRALIA: There had been a general trend of a reduction in fatalities in the minerals industry but unfortunately we seemed to have hit a bit of a plateau.

CLAIRE MOODIE: Melanie Stutsel is Director of Safety at the Minerals Council, which represents nine per cent of the industry, but FMG isn't one of its members.

MELANIE STUTSEL: I think those sorts of incidents are a reminder to companies that there's a need to be ever vigilant when it comes to safety. You can have great systems in place, you can have great national work health and safety laws but largely there's a portion of safety which is about culture and behaviour and so you need to keep ensuring that the people who are on your sites and the leaders on your sites reinforce that culture and behaviour at all times.

CLAIRE MOODIE: Les McLachlan isn't giving up. His union's taking action in the Federal Court, claiming its access to the Christmas Creek mine was delayed for six days after Kurt Williams' death.

LES MCLAUGHLAN: It's like going to visit the scene of an accident to try and determine what's happened after the road's been cleared, the fence has been fixed and everything that was involved has been moved. By the time I got there it was a clean area and nobody knew exactly what had happened and there was nothing there to investigate.

CLAIRE MOODIE: But none of this helps Dianne Andrews deal with the grief. She says she's been well looked after by FMG but is still desperate for answers about what really happened to her son.

DIANE ANDREW: They're stuck between a rock and a hard place too. They're not allowed to discuss anything while the investigation's happening, but that could take three years.

CLAIRE MOODIE: In the meantime, there's one ray of hope in this tragic tale. When Diane Andrew flew to WA after the accident, she also met her son's girlfriend for the first time.

DIANE ANDREW: Every day in the hotel Peta would come and she would have breakfast with us and on about the third day fronted up and said, "I've got a bombshell to drop," and she told me and of course I had mixed emotions. It was just like, "I don't know if I can really cope with this," but now she's 24 weeks pregnant and it is a little boy and now it's just something to look forward to and I guess, you know, that's Kurt. It's going to be Kurt and so, yeah, so we're really excited now.

CLAIRE MOODIE: The pair have kept in regular contact and in May Dianne Andrew will return to WA as a grandmother.

DIANE ANDREW: I've already got the flights booked for Perth for about 10 days after his due date so, yeah, I'm looking forward to meeting him.